Those Three Words
by Aeria
Summary: SPOILERS for the finale. You've been warned. Kurt Hummel never expected "I love you" before he escaped this stupid Midwestern town and made a name for himself and met someone. Now with a second installment for Blaine!
1. Chapter 1

Spoilers: The final...Seriously

A/N: Word Vomit Fluffy Fic. I was meant to do science today. Instead I got a little bit crazy over that scene in the final. As such...

**Spoilers: THE FINAL...Last Warning.**

Thanks to the beta who dived on this and had it fixed and better and all that as fast as I wrote it. Which is to say: fast. Well done her.

So it is just a fluffy look at the whole thing from Kurt's perspective and then the lovely scene with Blaine because...it turned my brain to mush and I wrote stuff. This is me still being incoherent. Completely Klaine centric.

Enjoy it, review it, make the world a better place because of it.

Words: 1800

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><p>Kurt has been dreaming about hearing Blaine say "I love you" since, well… <em>Teenage Dream<em>. He's a hopeless sappy romantic and in every single one of his favorite movies those words are uttered somewhere near the end of the two hours of film.

When Blaine chases after Jeremiah, Kurt revises his estimates. Remembers he'd never expected "I love you" before he escaped this stupid Midwestern town and made a name for himself and met someone.

When Blaine kisses Rachel, Kurt decides he doesn't even really want to hear Blaine say any such nonsense to him because he's obviously a boy who doesn't know his own heart and is altogether a little bit of a dick.

When Blaine says his sexy faces look like gas pains, Kurt folds in on himself and, even though somehow Blaine has crept back into his good graces, he finds himself relinquishing his hold on the fantasy of Blaine whispering "I love you" under a full moon or while they slow dance or as they embrace after a lengthy separation.

Then Blaine tells Kurt that he "moves him" and they kiss and a few minutes later they're boyfriends. And Blaine's being a little incoherent and stuttery and Kurt's not used to that and wonders if maybe it could be because of him.

That night, Kurt imagines a future with Blaine all while chastising himself that he's being a silly teenager and he should wait a little before planning a wedding. But Kurt is Kurt and he doesn't and 24 hours later he's got pretty much everything planned out in his mind—the suits, the cake, the flowers. He still tells himself he's being preemptive and stupid and Blaine chased Jeremiah and Rachel and this might not be the same for him.

Weeks pass and they make out far too often. They get caught by Finn, Burt, Carole twice, Mercedes via Skype and Rachel via barging in to the auditorium even though Kurt has it booked. It's magical—not the being caught, the rest—and everything he wanted but when he falls asleep at night, after he's stopped thinking about Blaine's skin and eyes and the dip in his back and occasionally letting his mind wander and his hands follow, every night, Kurt wonders if Blaine will ever say "I love you".

And then prom and Blaine's horror story and he tells Kurt "I'm crazy about you" and goes to prom even though he has every reason _not_ to. And maybe that was better than the movie scene Kurt imagined himself in. Because despite there being every reason to be terrified, his boyfriend slow danced with him in front of the whole junior class and they're _crazy_ about each other.

Then it's getting ready for Nationals and Kurt's life is turned upside down and all the people around him—his friends—are in shambles and he's just blissfully flowing through and he wonders if that's because of Blaine. Wonders if Blaine's become the cliché rock in his life, a constant. He kind of is. They've talked and half-jokingly (kind of not jokingly) planned out a few years into their future. Kurt talks about New York City and Blaine says things about travel and apartments and Kurt just nods his head and hums his agreement because he can see it too.

Even though they're young and it's silly and unreasonable to think it because they've never gotten past something equivalent to second base and are still learning about each other. And no one's said "I love you".

Then there's Nationals. It's a quick kiss goodbye on the porch and apprehension in Blaine's eyes and Kurt has no idea why but then they're apart and there is too much going on for Kurt to really care. He calls Blaine at night if he can keep his eyes open long enough but it's short and sweet and that's all.

Still, his friends around him, spinning out of control, crashing and burning and reigniting and Kurt just walking steadily through them. He doesn't know when he became old and wise but he feels it. Even after cheekily breaking in to a theatre and grinning and tripping and feeling like an idiot, he feels like the grown up. He sings with Rachel and knows exactly what he's choose between love and career and smiles to himself because his and Blaine have had that conversation and it was a little awkward but ended with smiles and blushes and then kissing.

But Nationals is a bust and he kind of saw that coming when they didn't start writing the songs until 48 hours beforehand and then the whole Rachel-Quinn-Finn thing just kind of explodes on the stage but he was there, with friends, being himself and feeling so, so confident and he _knows_ that's Blaine.

And then he's home, hugging his dad and then Carole and disappearing while they try to console Finn who is taking it so much harder than him. He texts Blaine as he struggles to keep his eyes open against the pillow and organizes coffee for early the next day.

They meet and hug and Blaine gets the table while Kurt gets their coffees and then Blaine sits by while Kurt just rambles. Days of being apart and Kurt feels like Blaine should have been there, should always be there, so he recounts every detail, every up and down and Blaine only voices a comment when he can't help himself. Halfway through Kurt realizes his coffee is getting cold and he's babbling uselessly and he pauses and stares and wonders if Blaine is staring back for his benefit.

But his chin is perched on his hand and his lips are quirked up, his brow furrowed as he wonders why Kurt's stopped and Kurt knows he's happy because the right side of his mouth is quirked slightly higher than the left and that's always so telling. Kurt doesn't even remember noticing that. So he plunges back in, tells of the drama and the performances and everything he saw and heard and did and laughs with Blaine at the tale. Grasps his boyfriend's hand on the table and it's unspoken but so loud—_one day _we'll_ go to New York and do it all_.

Lets his hand go, though Blaine's lingers, touching at air, and dives into the finale, the result, the utter devastation that doesn't feel so upsetting here in Ohio, where he's got Blaine hanging off his every word. Blaine knows the result but the story's enthralling, the recount of Santana trying to kill Rachel in their cramped hotel room, the plane trip home and then Blaine points out the obvious—the grin on Kurt's face and Kurt wants to say that it's because he's come home to Blaine but thinks it's too cliché and remembers how happy he's been for the last few months, how amazing New York had been, how everything had felt so _right_ and did so often now.

Blaine tilts his head and it's a tilt of endearment and Kurt knows that, revels in it and remembers breakfast at Tiffany's with Rachel and lines it up as his next story.

"I love you."

And Kurt has to swallow the lukewarm coffee he has in his mouth and stare and process because he'd stopped thinking about Blaine saying "I love you" and now, of course, he has and it's not like Blaine at all. It's not sung with backup dancers in an expensive building and in front of crowd. It's said on a whim, in the midst of a slow blink and a small shrug and—did it really just happen?

Did Kurt Hummel—a year ago afraid and alone and dreaming of being thirty and surrounded by different people—just hear the boy of his dreams say "I love you"? And not because of some grand gesture but just because… because of a whim?

No, not a whim. It's not off the cuff, even though it also is and Blaine _isn't _waiting. In all his fantasies, Kurt always, _always_, says it back because Blaine's looking at him expectantly but now, in reality not fantasy, Blaine just looks content and happy and it's a lazy kind of smile, not desperate, but perfectly in love and of course Kurt says it back. Of course.

"I love you, too." It sounds off the cuff, if a little breathless, and in the echoes of the Lima Bean he knows they'll say it again, a thousand times, wants to share that thought with Blaine but normally wouldn't but, damn, they've talked college and apartments and are in love. Blaine loves him, Says it like it's a comment on the weather and that's better than anything he ever saw in a movie because it's just true. A fact.

The thousand ways he could say it, he can only wonder. Wants to start finding out right now. Wants to say "thank you" and "yes" and… something more, but what is there after "I love you" uttered in a coffee shop at 9am?

And, of course, they're interrupted and now Blaine almost chokes on his coffee and Kurt wonders where his mind was, must remember to ask, and then Mercedes and Sam are there, grinning and chatting and a playful touch from Mercedes is just enough to make Kurt suspect something—stores that away for interrogation purposes later.

Then Blaine's turning back to him, rambling about audition songs and sheet music and there's shyness there, just a touch, and Kurt wonders if he's changed the topic on purpose, wonders if it's because they had an audience and this is intensely private or whether it's because he feels the electricity of it and doesn't know what to do with it.

Kurt lets him ramble a few minutes, nodding agreement and then pulling a face at an utterly horrible option and promises to change his mind. He still has half a cold coffee in front of him but Blaine's is empty. He stands, answering Blaine's arched eyebrow with his own and offers a hand. When Blaine takes it he moves quickly, pulling him towards the door, determined, direct, even though Kurt has no idea where they're going, just wants to go and be together.

They end up in Blaine's car, lips pressed with hardly a thought spared for any potential voyeurs. When Blaine's tongue slips over his, a groan reverberating from the skin of Blaine's throat into Kurt's hand, Kurt has to pull back because he's waited so long and wants to be sure he didn't dream it.

"You love me," he mumbles against his boyfriend's lips.

Blaine's lips curve up in response and if Kurt would open his eyes and move back and look he'd see a blush because Blaine hadn't meant to say it, had been saving those words for a special occasion and was surprised when they'd slipped out over coffee. Nonetheless, Blaine hums in the affirmative over Kurt's lips, noses bumping, lips skimming.

Then Kurt kisses him again, hands in the back of his hair where he's learned it's still soft curls and then he pulls back, just for a second with eyes wide and murmurs, "Wow," and Blaine just wants to tell him again.

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><p>I am still so happy about how those 'I love yous' were handled. I mean, Blaine...just...Blaine. Oh...and Kurt. Also Kurt.<p>

Reviews would be lovely but I understand if you can't type. I don't know how I'm managing. Hee!


	2. It Just Was

Title: It Just Was

Rating: T but it might actually be an R...

Spoilers: The finale.

A/N: Okay so this is just a companion piece for Those Three Words that kind of just happened, as fic usually does with me. It's a switch to Blaine's POV and covers a different angle and, actually, isn't completely compatible with the first part. But I'm putting it onto this one because they're very much a pair. Thank you so very, very much for all the lovely reviews you left me on the first chapter, they seem to have inspired me and you can't know how much they mean to me. Seriously, some of those were just epic, epic reviews that left me with a massive grin for the entire day. Thanks also to Tessa the beta for reading through this one as well and poking me to write the next one.

Anyway, on with it. Read it, enjoy it, review it. Or critique it, I'm always up for that. And never be afraid to throw ideas at me, you never know what might grab my interest.

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><p>Blaine realizes he's in love with Kurt when Kurt gets up in front of the Warblers and sings for a recently deceased bird. He looks fantastic and doesn't hold back his tears and that's when Blaine realizes it. Ten minutes later he decides he's being pretty stupid because love isn't silly like that and whatever he's realized it isn't love. He redefines it as attraction and like-mindedness and compatibility. He thinks about Kurt for the day, replays conversations and disagreements and fleeting glances in his head and wonders why he hadn't realized it before the dead bird.<p>

They match each other in a sublime way that he's only ever seen on screen or within the pages of a novel. They agree on the things that matter, disagree enough to make them individuals and have already made it through so many ups and downs and embarrassments. And Blaine likes Kurt because he's adorable and weird and exuberant and considerate and thoughtful and challenging and growing into someone even more amazing before Blaine's very eyes.

Blaine wants to say all of this to Kurt but realizes over fake gems and a tiny casket that Kurt's eyes are hesitant and wary even though he's talking about moments and emotions. Blaine wants to kick himself for taking months to see what was right in front of him and for accidentally being unkind in the past and cuts his rambling off—summarizes. "You move me."

Certainly not "I love you" because he doesn't. You don't fall in love in an instant.

Kurt blinks and there's a smile tugging at his lips and Blaine decides against any further rambling, kissing Kurt and being kissed back and when they break apart there's no hesitation left between them and an hour after that they're in a relationship and have labeled it and are boyfriends. The word makes Kurt giggle in a way that makes Blaine's stomach knot.

And they're so, so happy like that. They hold hands and kiss and soon enough are doing things that make them blush even as Blaine murmurs that it's perfectly natural for teenagers to fool around and Kurt just rolls his eyes and gets more and more playful and adventurous with his kisses.

Their first fight is dramatic and stupid but they're both inclined towards both of those things and when they make up it's with sloppy kisses and mumbled apologies and the realization that they can and will and _should_ fight. And they should make up. They always will. They fight about big things and they make up with flowers and chocolate and hand written notes. When Kurt tries to start a fight about Blaine's taste in shoes Blaine guesses his game in seconds and they end up uselessly tickling each other on the bed until there are tears running down Blaine's cheeks and he pushes Kurt onto the floor.

Kurt transfers back to McKinley and it's smoother than expected. And then prom time approaches and Blaine says "I'm crazy about you" even though his brain is screaming "I love you" and he can't shut it up and he's still not sure that's something you say as a teenager to the boy you've been dating for a couple of months and who has just found out you've got a past and who is looking at you with hope and trepidation in his eyes. So instead Blaine agrees to go to prom and it falls apart but ends up being put back together again and they're stronger because of it. It's a rollercoaster of ups and downs that they both kind of want to forget about but instead end up talking about for the rest of the weekend.

The first time Kurt makes Blaine come it's by accident and in his pants and on the couch and he really thought he had a few more seconds of rubbing against Kurt above him before he had to push him away and maybe he would have if Kurt hadn't slipped his hands beneath Blaine's shirt and up and scratched and bit at his neck and mewled "Oh, Blaine," into his ear.

It's a shock and a disaster for a moment as Blaine rides out an orgasm against Kurt's thigh and Kurt just watches and bites his own lip to stop from speaking, from breaking the moment or coming himself and then Blaine's eyes open and go wide and he scrambles out from under him and blushes and apologizes so profusely that Kurt ends up laughing at him. It's terribly awkward for a few minutes as Blaine can't stop talking and Kurt ends up with the hiccups from laughing so hard while attempting to swallow his laughter.

They end up in the kitchen, Blaine shifting uncomfortably from foot to foot, mortified by the sticky mess in his pants and trying to ignore it while Kurt gulps down a glass of water. Kurt's hiccups subside and that's when Blaine becomes aware of Kurt's jeans or rather what's straining beneath them and with disbelief that he's not in trouble for going too far, that his boyfriend isn't freaking out, asks, "Are you…?"

Kurt laughs again but it's lower and breathless and then he tugs Blaine to him and grinds against him, arching and groaning and whispering something Blaine must have misheard—_must_ have because Kurt doesn't say things like that. Kurt drags one of Blaine's hands down to the front of his jeans, pressing there until Blaine takes the hint and palms him through the thick denim and stares wide-eyed moments later when Kurt's body tenses and his breath catches and he comes undone.

It's still awkward after that, both of them feeling the weight of something strange and new and more. Something beckoning and tempting. But it's not awkward enough to stop them from doing it again half an hour later on Kurt's bed. Even if Kurt insists the lights stay off.

Two days later Kurt insists the lights stay on and mumbles something about wanting to remember what Blaine looks like and Blaine forces them to take it slower, to build something between them and it's better and less awkward than the times before.

The following day they want desperately to do it again. When Blaine comes over after school, Kurt just wants to drag him upstairs and get his shirt off and maybe dare to slip his hands down the front of his pants. Except Burt is home and talkative and keeping them downstairs and Kurt just ends up staring at the dark cotton stretched across Blaine's chest as though he can will it out of existence.

When Blaine has to leave Kurt can only press a kiss to the corner of his mouth because his dad's watching and then Blaine's gone, wondering the whole drive home if the way Burt was staring hard at him was because he somehow knew the steady stream of images passing behind his eyes. A half an hour later he Skypes his boyfriend just like most nights, and wonders if they can get off together like this, whether he can ask. Somehow they up talking about New York until one in the morning instead.

The next day is the day before Kurt leaves for Nationals and Blaine has school and tutoring and Warbler practice and can only find a half hour's pause to visit Kurt, say goodbye and wish him luck. They sit on the couch as Burt and Carole bustle around them, present but giving them space. Blaine listens again as Kurt rambles about what he's going to see and do and ends by saying he wishes Blaine was going with him.

Before he can stop himself, Blaine's whispering "One day," and pressing a kiss to his cheek.

Kurt looks at him with piercing, considering eyes and then he says, his voice a strange mixture of determination and hesitance, "I think I'm going to want to go there after school."

He lets his words hang there and Blaine hopes he's saying what Kurt wants to hear because it's what Blaine wants with all his heart and for so many reasons and he's only just realized it. "I think I'm going to want to go with you."

Sure enough, Kurt grins and buries his head in the crook of Blaine's neck, his grin only widening against Blaine's skin as Blaine presses a kiss to the top of his head. They sit still for a few moments longer and then Blaine moves, sighing because he doesn't want to leave at all but he's already stayed longer than he should have. Kurt follows him out the front door, closes it behind them and presses a chaste kiss to his mouth, lingering just a little but not moving, just smiling and smelling and breathing in. Making a memory. Blaine wills himself to do the same, to concentrate, but he's overwhelmed in the moment.

It doesn't sink in until he's driven halfway back to Dalton.

That _that_ was when he knew, that _that's_ the story he'll tell anyone that will listen in a dozen years' time, that standing there on his boyfriend's front doorstep, Kurt barely touching him but making a memory to last the few days of separation, that _that_ was when Blaine Anderson knew he was desperately, stupidly in love.

God knows how long he's been like that but in that moment, as Kurt breathed in and his lips quirked up, his eyes closed and his fingers slipping over Blaine's arm, that moment was when Blaine's brain stopped screaming "I love you" and he stopped imagining saying it and he stopped imagining Kurt saying it back. And it just _was. _

Except now he's thinking about it again, wants to say it and finds himself mumbling it as he drives, mumbling "I love you, Kurt," to no one at all and then saying it stronger, then yelling it and feeling stupid and amazing and fumbling for his phone as he drives.

He hits the speed dial for Kurt's mobile and holds the phone to his ear as it rings. His boyfriend answers with a quip about missing him already and Blaine realizes in an instant that this isn't how you do these things and, if nothing else, Kurt would never let him forget it if he first professed his love over the phone. He scrambles for something to say as Kurt calls his name because he's dropped the conversation. Blaine makes a lame remark about indeed missing him already and hangs up. Kurt will probably think it's just him being weird.

Then Kurt flies away to a different state and is run off his feet and only calls Blaine twice to talk fleetingly about New York and how amazing it is and sound breathless and happy and then cuts the conversation short as he's dragged off for another adventure.

Blaine's left in Ohio, repeating those three little words to himself as he falls asleep and resisting the urge to tell random strangers in the street or enlist the Warblers for a serenade when Kurt's plane finally lands. He doesn't think Kurt would like that.

Then Kurt calls and tells Blaine that New Directions didn't make the cut and they're coming home winless and he sounds disappointed but not broken and ends the conversation sounding excited and saying he can't wait to show New York to Blaine.

They organize coffee for the morning after Kurt gets back and all Blaine can think when they meet in the doorway to the Lima Bean is that he loves this boy. Loves him really and truly and forever and it should be terrifying to know you're a teenager and thinking things like that and knowing they're true but it isn't. Kurt hugs him hard and then sends Blaine to find a table while he gets the coffee and then Kurt is talking a million miles a minute again and Blaine can only rest his chin on his hand and listen.

Stare and listen and mostly get lost in the convoluted retelling of how New Directions lost Nationals because Kurt's looking back at him with bright eyes and a smile and talking breathlessly and with humor and Blaine loves him. Halfway through the story, Kurt pauses and looks back and Blaine wonders if he's given the game away with the blatant adoration he knows is painted across his face. Kurt just smiles and gulps at his coffee, then grabs at Blaine's hand and squeezes it briefly and then keeps talking.

He tells of the aftermath of their destruction, of Santana in the hotel room and the plane ride home and Blaine has to wonder aloud why Kurt isn't sad, actually seems the opposite and Kurt just smiles and puts it down to the New York of it all and there are echoes between them that speak of the future. Their future. And New York. And happiness.

And maybe it's because Blaine has been saying it inside his head, believing it, _knowing_ it even since Kurt left for New York and thinks of it like some sort of timeless universal constant but now he says it again, only half aware that he's saying it out loud and Kurt looks surprised, swallows and Blaine just watches him, the same blissfully content look on his face because he knows Kurt loves him back.

What they have is absolutely utterly a two-way thing.

And then Kurt says it back, quickly and still breathless, smiling, eyes impossibly bright and that's all there is. "I love you, too."

Kurt continues and says it's been a good year and Blaine finds himself agreeing even though he's mentally counting off the things that have been terrible for them, for Kurt especially. But they're in love and that kind of trumps anything else.

Blaine kind of wants to say it again, to hear Kurt say it back, but they're interrupted by Sam and Mercedes and by the time they're alone again the moment has passed and Blaine just dives into the next topic of conversation: the summer and everything that goes with it. They discuss his audition pieces first and then Kurt's musical and then the chatter dies and there's a moment of comfortable silence. Blaine finds himself wondering how many times he'll say "I love you" before the summer's through—how many different ways he can say it and instantly his mind provides him with a dozen possibilities.

"What?" Kurt asks, startling him.

Blaine's eyes have glazed over a little and his grin is even more dopey than usual and he blushes to have been caught and it makes Kurt ask him "_What_?" again, more insistently.

Blaine's hand finds his under the table, fingers interlacing. "Just—" and this time, the second time, there's wonder and awe and amazement in his voice, "Just—we're in love."

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><p>All together now: Awwwwww. Hope you all got fuzzy feelings from this. As always, let me know!<p> 


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